Freedom Convoy post-mortem examined through libertarian lens

By Alejandra Pulido-Guzman - Lethbridge Herald on April 23, 2022.

A flag waver greets a line up trucks as part of the protest convoy as it arrived in Coutts back in January. Herald file photos by Dale Woodard

LETHBRIDGE HERALDapulido@lethbridgeherald.com

An online presentation provided by the University of Lethbridge Retired Academic Staff Association offered an insight into what Libertarianism is and how it has emerged recently in Canada.
Sociologist Trevor Harrison presented Cry Freedom: The Rise of Libertarian Ideology where he discussed its recent emergence in Canada as witnessed by the Freedom Convoy that occupied Ottawa and several border crossings in February.
“From the work of a theorist by name of Boaz and the short little definition he uses, he says (Libertarianism) it’s the view that each person has the right to live his life in any way he chooses to as long as he respects the equal rights of others,” said Harrison.
He said Libertarianism is an ideology, but we should not always be fooled by thinking people are acting necessarily in any kind of ideological way.
Harrison said we should not confuse the practicalities of politics versus how academics would describe libertarianism.
He added that some politicians are ideological. He believes Jason Kenney is closer to an ideologue than most politicians we have, but most of the time politicians borrow from ideologies they think are really useful.
Harrison said one moment they would talk about democracy, the next moment they would talk about freedom, and the next about equality.
Harrison said non-politicians are even less ideological, while most people will use all kinds of terms in common parlance.
“I think in the convoy, they would pick and choose things from ideologies that they particularly like and that fit with their particular values, beliefs, biases and experiences,” said Harrison.
He said the word freedom is being used without any kind of critical thought about what it actually means.
“I would point out here is that almost assuredly, everybody who was part of the Freedom Convoy and went down to the Coutts border or wherever, are not people who voted for the Liberal Party or the NDP or the Green Party. In all likelihood these were Conservative and Peoples Party of Canada voters,” said Harrison.
He said the hostility towards the federal Liberals in western Canada and in Alberta, and particularly the signs denouncing Justin Trudeau, points to the fact that this was largely a partisan effort but encouraged then in turn by the mainstream Conservative Party overriding the Freedom Convoy.
Harrison analyzed why the Freedom Convoy was successful and mentioned the fact that it was largely thanks to the size of the vehicles used.
“The problem with trucks is they are really big and once they got in certain places, now you’ve got a problem of how to move them,” said Harrison.
He said the authorities were actually rather naive about this event that occurred in Ottawa transpiring the way it did.
“The idea at the beginning apparently, was officials believed the trucks would drive through town and would be a two or three day protest and leave again,” said Harrison.
He said that once the protest took hold, the sheer number of other people who started to come became a problem.
“Breaking up something that has 50 people is very different from 500, very different from 5000 or 10,000, so the sheer size created a real problem that added to a sense of, from the convoy’s perspective, success,” said Harrison.
He said that given everything else, the officials just simply did not handle it very well.
“The media actually fed into it as well, it certainly became a thing for the longest period of time and not only in Canada but of course becomes a thing in the United States and even over in Europe, spawning kind of copycat movements with trucks and other equipment,” said Harrison.
He said the police can be greatly faulted for being really slow and ineffective in their response and as we have seen, compromised in some instances.
“The response to this, to those police officers as has happened, is they need to be fired because they’ve lost track of what their actual responsibilities are,” said Harrison.
He added that there was jurisdictional confusion as the three levels of government did not work together very well.
“When Trudeau actually announced the measures that would end this, I think that actually symbolically gave a boot to the officials to do what they needed to do all along,” said Harrison.

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